This application is based upon and claims the benefit of priority from the prior Japanese Patent Applications No. 11-112190, filed Apr. 20, 1999; and No. 11-113606, filed Apr. 21, 1999, the entire contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.
This invention relates to an electrical board commonly used for different devices and an electrical board device having the electrical board mounted thereon, for example, an electrical board device for effectively utilizing the board space by separately providing printed wiring boards each having a switch input pattern or the like formed thereon and a method for manufacturing an apparatus having the above electrical board device.
In recent years, an attempt has been made to save space and reduce the number of parts by combining preset boards or designing the board to be commonly used. For this purpose, for example, a design for forming a switch pattern in a circuit pattern and bringing an operation member into direct contact therewith to effect the circuit switching is used.
Further, in order to effectively utilize the electrical board, the board has been designed to be a common board so that it can be mounted on as many different types of devices as possible. In this connection, it is noted that the diversity of not only the color but also the external appearance of a device assembled as a product is required, and it is also required to produce various types of products of a small number by using parts supplied.
However, when the conventional uniform electrical board is mounted on one of a plurality of different types of devices, the operation input position of a button of the operation member tends to be determined in the same position and the diversity of the design or the like for a plurality of different types of devices has a limitation.
Further, the similarity of the external appearance of the products may not be caused by the external appearance of the device itself, but the uniformity of the electrical board used for the device may be the main cause in many cases. That is, the degree of freedom is low in the arrangement position and the direction of outer covering parts including an operation member which is directly or indirectly connected to the board, and the circuit design and board construction in which only one specification and one connecting configuration are permitted are often observed.
In order to provide the individualities of discrete products for many products, it is required to realize a specification of external appearance for giving different impressions of the external appearances simply by slightly changing the arrangement of a common part. Further, it is required to provide for variations in the external appearance and operability in order that the electrical board can be used in various apparatuses, for example, such as cameras.
As described above, a change can be made possible to some extent (variations) by considering the construction of the electrical board and the layout of the circuit pattern, but it is difficult in practice and no concrete method has been achieved.
Further, in the conventional electric device, a printed wiring board having, various types of electrical parts mounted thereon is mounted to perform the various electrical control operations. For example, in the case of a camera, a flexible printed wiring board is provided on which a central operation processing unit (CPU) for controlling the whole portion of the camera, an interface of the CPU, an EEPROM which is a nonvolatile memory, and a date CPU for controlling the date printing operation and the like are mounted, and the above units are electrically connected to one another via a wiring pattern.
In the first prior art, as shown in FIG. 6, a switch input pattern 101 for electrical switching is formed on a printed wiring board 100, a wiring pattern 104 is formed in an area other than the forming area of the switch input pattern 101, the switch input pattern 101 and an IC chip 103 are electrically connected together, and the IC chip 103 and another IC chip 102 are electrically connected via the wiring pattern 104.
Further, in the second prior art, in a case where a flexible printed wiring board is used as the above printed wiring board, it is commonly effected to provide a preset arm portion on the flexible printed wiring board, form a preset switch input pattern on the arm portion and bend and use the arm portion when it is actually applied to a camera or the like.
However, in the first prior art, since it is necessary to form the wiring pattern 104 or the like in an area other than the switch input pattern 101, the area of the printed wiring board 100 becomes large and the cost thereof is increased. In this respect, it is required to efficiently use the area of the printed wiring board 100.
Particularly, when the flexible printed wiring board is used, it is possible to fold and accommodate the same in the camera or the like, for example, but if a hard printed wiring board is used, enlargement of the board causes the camera itself to be enlarged.
Further, as in the second prior art, in a case where the flexible printed wiring board is used, the efficiency of taking out the material of the flexible printed wiring board is lowered in the manufacturing process if the arm portion for forming the switch input pattern is formed, and as a result, there occurs a problem that the cost thereof is increased.
(Object)
This invention has been made by taking the above problems into consideration and an object of this invention is to provide an electrical board device always having the same specification but which enables different external appearances.
Another object of this invention is to provide an electrical board device in which the board space can be efficiently used and the board itself can be made small.
Still another object of this invention is to provide a method for manufacturing the above device.
In order to solve the above problem and attain the above objects, the following measure is taken in this invention. In this invention, the electrical board is so designed as to be commonly used in devices having different external appearances and the electrical board is selectively mounted on one of the devices having different external appearances.
According to a first embodiment, an electrical board device having an electrical board to be arranged in an apparatus is proposed which comprises a switch pattern for receiving an input in response to an external operation; and a connection land portion formed to be continuous to the switch pattern.
Further, a device is proposed which has an electrical board arranged in a preset apparatus and comprises a first electrical board which includes a switch pattern for receiving an operation input in response to an operation from the exterior and a land portion for connection formed to be continuous to the switch pattern; and a second electrical board having a switch pattern connected to the connection land portion and formed in an area other than the switch pattern.
According to a second embodiment, a method for manufacturing an apparatus including the electrical board device with the above construction is proposed.
Additional objects and advantages of the invention will be set forth in the description which follows, and in part will be obvious from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention. The objects and advantages of the invention may be realized and obtained by means of the instrumentalities and combinations particularly pointed out hereinafter.